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Ok, a thread about voter fraud where I am trying to be rational and even-minded.
1. In general and historically, the conservative obsession with voter fraud has been bizarre and counter-productive, potentially alienating groups of voters. And more fundamentally, it reflects ...
1. In general and historically, the conservative obsession with voter fraud has been bizarre and counter-productive, potentially alienating groups of voters. And more fundamentally, it reflects ...
... a common partisan impulse to retreat into a fantasy world. If we have trouble winning some elections fair and square, we should own up to the fact and look at it rationally.
2. As best as I can tell, the honest historical assessment is that voter fraud can and does ...
2. As best as I can tell, the honest historical assessment is that voter fraud can and does ...
... happen in the US. It does so rarely and in such minute amounts as to not swing the results of most elections, except potentially for dog catcher. But the fact highlights that US voting systems really are vulnerable to such fraud, at least to some (unknowable) extent.
Furthermore, if you go back further in history, voter fraud is almost a hallowed tradition in some urban political machines. I'm #OldEnoughToRemember when the unique vulnerability of US voting systems to fraud was an obsession of the left. Of course now, The Narrative has ...
... changed. Does that mean the substance has changed? Furthermore, to any sane person who manages to take a step back from the kabuki of US partisan politics, the fact that a major political party in the US opposes as a rule mandatory photo ID to vote ought to be baffling...
... and alarming. Every four years, the US embarrasses itself to the rest of the advanced world with the rube goldberg contraption that is its voting systems. And the same side that is usually eager to imitate progressive Europe and mortified at the idea of looking bad to ...
... the eyes of enlightened foreigners insists that nothing is wrong. Not necessarily suspicious, but certainly bizarre.
This is just to set the background for how I am trying to look at things. We're left with the basic fact that, while the US system is uniquely ...
This is just to set the background for how I am trying to look at things. We're left with the basic fact that, while the US system is uniquely ...
... susceptible to fraud (at least by the standards of peer democracies), historically fraud hasn't meant much.
What could be different this time? Well, there are two obvious answers.
3. Trump is Literally Hitler, right? The entire Narrative from the left has been that ...
What could be different this time? Well, there are two obvious answers.
3. Trump is Literally Hitler, right? The entire Narrative from the left has been that ...
... Trump is a unique and unprecedented threat to everything they hold sacred. And unprecedented threats call for unprecedented responses? I'm not trying to snark, here. Clearly, many people who are politically active on the left earnestly, sincerely, and deeply believe that ...
... Trump is an unprecedented and existential threat to their what they cherish most. This is simply a new fact. And it is human nature that some people who sincerely believe this would also believe that any means necessary would be proper to stop Trump. I mean, we're at ...
... the point where non-trivial segments of the left have essentially embraced political violence (if you include those who have justified or excused it, it is not a fringe), which is arguably more profound norm-breaking than ballot stuffing.
4. This time around, because of Covid (let's say because of Covid), there was an unprecedented amount of mail-in ballots, and mail-in ballots are uniquely susceptible to fraud. If you don't trust me, maybe you will trust the New York Times, which in 2012, i.e. before The ...
Narrative changed, was warning about the dangers of mail-in ballots. https://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/07/us/politics/as-more-vote-by-mail-faulty-ballots-could-impact-elections.html
For perspective, France banned mail-in ballots *in 1975*, specifically to crack down on vote fraud, which was still a problem in a few local districts back then. So, you know, America, you're welcome to join us in the 20th century of democracy.
And we also know that the Ds heavily encouraged mail-in voting. Of course, this is officially because of Covid. But there are other ways to interpret that move... And in any case it means that an unprecedented number of ballots were cast through an intrinsically unsafe system.
So to sum up, we have:
- A historical background of minor-but-real fraud and unique susceptibility of the US system to fraud;
- New circumstances which provide the left with both motive and opportunity for fraud on a new scale.
- A historical background of minor-but-real fraud and unique susceptibility of the US system to fraud;
- New circumstances which provide the left with both motive and opportunity for fraud on a new scale.
This certainly, in my view, creates a completely rational case for *being alert to the possibility* of large-scale voter fraud.
5. Now, and this is important, most of the "evidence" I've seen so far of voter fraud has been very weak. But not all. I am still trying to wrap my head around the notion that Pennsylvania is supposed to count non-postmarked mail-in ballots received after the day of the election.
I am also looking at other things that I don't want to talk about publicly before I am reasonably certain one way or another.
6. Of course, the subtext for all this is that this is no way to run a country. As a civilization, our sense-making apparatus is completely broken. And elite discourse has elevated process over substance as an epistemological standard, which I believe has been a disaster.
If you're not clear on what that means, think about a sentence like "This study was peer-reviewed!" which, strictly speaking, tells you *nothing* about the actual substance of the study, only about the *process* that led to the study being published.
"Process epistemology" is a heuristic. And we need it. We can't all spend all our days independently verifying every claim that is made, and so we rely on process. "Experts looked at it." "This article was fact-checked by the New York Times."
When the processes are healthy, this is an enormous asset, enabling us all collectively to save incredible amounts of time. But even in the best of times, processes will never be perfect (they *can't* be), and so we should never lose sight of the fact that process can only ever..
... *at best* correlate with substance. And when the processes are unhealthy, process epistemology becomes a disaster. BS increases at a geometric rate, and elevating substance over process becomes a civic duty, the only conceivable way to "bend the curve" of BS.
Back in January and February, it is because I trusted uncredentialed anonymous obsessives on social media over credentialed experts that I and my family were able to protect ourselves from the coronavirus.
This was failure by our collective sense-making and decision-making apparatus on a gigantic scale, with arguably more deleterious consequences than knowing which degenerate Boomer will have his agenda vetoed by Mitch McConnell.
"The WHO says there's no human-to-human transmission of the novel coronavirus." "But what about all this Weibo samizdat that my friends are messaging me. I'm not sure I should trust them. But remind me why I should trust the WHO, again?" "Shut up racist."
7. If there is no good evidence of significant fraud, we should accept the results of the election, both because it's the right thing to do, and so that we can calmly and rationally look at what went right and what went wrong and draw lessons for the future.
(By contrast, if there *were* good evidence of significant fraud, it would behoove on *all* people of good will to shout it from the rooftops and demand accountability.)
Some of my anonymous internet obsessive friends are not convinced that the election is clean. And it is *perfectly rational* for me to extend them the benefit of the doubt, at least for a little while further. Indeed it would be irrational not to.
So that's where I am at the moment.
Addendum: This general problem of incertitude is all the more reason to encourage Trump lawsuits in contested states, to get all the facts aired and certified. I really, really don't want this thing to become our side's "Russia!"
Addendum 2: I think I invented the phrase "even-minded" up there? Both "open-minded" and "even-keeled" were in my mind. I like it.
Addendum 3: In the interest of fairness I am sharing this very good @Ike_Saul thread debunking the various claims that are made on voting fraud. Overall it is very good though I'm not yet quite satisfied by some things. https://twitter.com/Ike_Saul/status/1324435797374808066
